


Monster

by Jabberwocky (Sisterwives)



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, F/M, M/M, Matespritship, Mind Control, Mind Honey, Pale Romance | Moirallegiance, Psionics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-15
Updated: 2011-12-15
Packaged: 2017-10-27 09:15:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,189
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/294132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sisterwives/pseuds/Jabberwocky
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Under the influence of the mind honey Vriska made him ingest, Sollux kills his matesprit, Aradia. Both he and Tavros are suffering, and they are drawn together into a budding moirallegiance.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Monster

Aradia never liked calling on the spirits of the dead to do her bidding. But, she reasoned, some people just had it coming. And she couldn’t let Vriska go unpunished. Not after what she did to Tavros. She didn’t allow herself to feel guilty, not even as her Trollian pinged and blue words appeared on her screen.

AG: Araaaaaaaadiiiiiiiiaaaaaaaa.  
AA: what  
AG: Nice trick! With the ghosts and all. Man, you got me pretty good.  
AA: id rather n0t talk t0 y0u  
AG: Fair enough!  
AG: Just wanted to say I’m sorry, that’s all.  
AA: im n0t the 0ne y0u sh0uld ap0l0gize t0  
AG: Yeah I know. I’ll make it up to him some day. Don’t worry!

——————————————

Vriska snarled. There was no way she was going to let Aradia escape unscathed. She had messed with the wrong troll. An idea slowly came to her, and a devious grin curled her lips as she brought her hands up to her temples, casting her mind out in the direction of the nearest major city. Tendrils of thoughts felt their way towards the subconscious of Sollux Captor, whose bipolar mind was fortunately impressionable tonight. But she wasn’t going to make him kill Aradia outright. Oh no. She was going to let him come to that conclusion himself, with just a little help from a powerful, triggering substance he happened to possess in copious quantities…

——————————————

AG: Anyway, hey guess what?  
AG: I’ve got a message for you from your 8oyfriend.  
AG: He’s outside your hive right now!  
AA: n0t falling f0r it  
AG: Take a look.  
AA: i d0nt see anything 0ut there  
AG: Well ok, I’m just the messenger. If you want to risk missing him then suit yourself.  
AG: L8er!!!!!!!!

Aradia stared at Vriska’s words on her screen. It was impossible. There was no way Sollux could be here. Surely he would have told her if he was making the journey all the way to her hive, wouldn’t he?

Still… it wouldn’t hurt to check. She peeked out the window, and a thrill of delight coursed through her when she recognized the unmistakable form of Sollux, suspended in midair with a little assistance from his psionics.

Aradia quickly unlatched the front door to her hive and hurried out to greet him. “Sollux?” she called out, her face lighting up with a genuine smile. But her hopeful expression dimmed when Sollux didn’t answer her, choosing to hover ominously in the air, silent and foreboding. Her eyes widened in shock and fear as he raised his arms up, a surge of electricity sparking from behind his glasses.

She opened her mouth to cry out, but it was too late.

The last thing she saw was the flashing of blue and red as her world came crashing down around her, armageddon begot by the one troll whom she cared about most.

Vriska pulled her consciousness away from Sollux entirely. “Arrivederci, Megido,” she purred, sitting back in her chair in contentment.

——————————————

Sollux was swimming in a haze of blue and red, punctured by the sharp stabbing of a migraine that was splitting his head in two. Consciousness slowly returned to him as he realized he was acutely aware of the pain that was shooting through his entire skull. He blinked and sat up, groggy and disoriented. “What…” he mumbled, confused as to why he wasn’t in his respiteblock or, indeed, anywhere in his communal hive stem in the city. He glanced around, trying to get his bearings. He was in the countryside, but where— it hit him with a jolt when he recognized the fragments of stone wall that were part of Aradia’s hive, but why…

Sollux looked down at himself, and his blood ran cold, horror running up his spine when he recognized the sticky yellow substance that stained his shirt and hands. “AA!” he called, panic overtaking him. He staggered to his feet and stumbled through the soot and rubble of Aradia’s decimated hive.

He had done the unthinkable and eaten the mind honey. If he was the one responsible for this destruction, he didn’t think he could live with himself.

He was afraid of what he would find, but the terror that held him in his grip wouldn’t let him rest until he found Aradia and made sure that she was safe. She had to be safe, she _had to_ —

He stopped short at the sight of what was unmistakably her body, but it was too still to be anything but a corpse. He moved blindly until he reached her prone form. Her eyes were open, wide-eyed and glassy as they stared emptily at the dusky sky.

A wave of horror and complete and utter _terror_ washed over Sollux, chilling him to his bones. “ No,” he rasped. “No, oh god, no.” He cupped his hands over his mouth and sank down on the ground, his legs giving out beneath him, unable to support his own weight anymore.

Aradia’s curly mane was singed from the psionic blast, the sickening smell of burnt hair nearly turning his stomach, and the charred hem of her skirt was torn and jagged from where it had burst into flames.

“Oh god,” Sollux said, his voice cracking and growing more and more desperate and high-pitched. “Oh god oh god oh god!” He reached out a trembling hand to cup her face, but the warmth, the glow that lit her up from within, was fading fast. “I did this to you.”

He couldn’t hold back the tears that were misting up in his eyes, and he gave up and cried, cried like he was two sweeps old and had skinned his knee. Only this time, his clumsy oaf of a lusus wasn’t there to cradle him in one giant hand and croon to him. And even if Bicyclops had been present, there was nothing he could do to make him feel better. More alone than ever, Sollux hugged Aradia’s lifeless form to his chest.

He had hoped against hope that he would feel something beneath his hands, the slightest twitch, the faintest fluttering of a heartbeat. But it was no use. She wouldn’t wake.

And it was all his fault.

He clutched at his matesprit’s body, willing her to wake up already, because this can’t be happening, _it can’t_. He rubbed his forearm across his eyes, trying to scrub away the stream of yellow tears, but more kept welling up to take their place. He wasn’t even crying in a dignified fashion, which made it even worse. This was gasping, choking with each breath, snot running down his face, full blown _sobbing_. He didn’t know how long he spent like that, rocking back and forth as he held Aradia. Time was meaningless to him. Nothing mattered anymore.

After what seemed like sweeps, Sollux’s sobs slowed to shuddery gasps before finally petering out. He gripped his head, lightheaded from crying so hard. With one last sniffle, he wiped his nose and with a newfound resolve, laid Aradia gingerly on the ground and climbed to his feet.

Despite the screaming of his skinny cluckbeast limbs, Sollux picked Aradia up, hefting her into his arms. He was a hacker, a computer nerd. He didn’t work out like Equius or swim all day like Feferi. He preferred staying inside, surrounded by his gamegrubs and the comforting glow of his husktop. He didn’t need to practice fighting, not when he had psionics at his disposal.

The rational half of his think pan told him that it would be easier and more practical if he just lifted Aradia with his psychic powers, but the other part, the part that was half-mad with grief, won out. He was going to do this properly, and that meant using his physical strength like a real troll, as meager as it may be.

Trolls might not bury their dead, but that didn’t mean that Sollux couldn’t honor her in death. Holding her close to his chest, he carried her through the debris and soot that was all that remained of Aradia’s hive. Another barb of pain and guilt stabbed him through the heart when he saw the curled up form of Aradia’s lusus. She looked as if she could have been sleeping, if it wasn’t for the fact that a jagged piece of rock, a remnant from the outer walls of the devastated hive, had fractured her spine. Sollux swallowed, his stomach lurching at the sight of the rust-red blood that was seeping out onto the ground.

Slowly, carefully, he approached the forest that lied on the outskirts of the land that surrounded Aradia’s lawnring. He went deeper into the thicket, fighting brambles and briars until he came across a clearing. The patch of grass was void of trees, a bed of colorful wildflowers the only living thing to honor Aradia in her final resting place.

——————————————

Sollux didn’t leave his house for days. He didn’t eat, didn’t sleep, and only bathed sparingly. He stayed up for three consecutive days coding, working straight through the morning in a manic-depressive phase. Coding made the demons go away, dulled the voices that probed at him, whispering, “ _Killer… murderer… monster… you killed your matesprit… you spilled her blood… you monster._ ”

He was in no fit condition to receive visitors, but when the buzzer in his hivestem sounded, he made the reckless decision, fueled by a sleepless high, to answer it. He took the stairs down to the lobby of his communal hivestem to find Tavros waiting on the opposite side of the glass door.

“TV, what are you doing here?” he asked as he let him in, wincing at the hoarseness of his voice, croaky from lack of use.

Tavros looked up at him with red-rimmed eyes and let out a little hiccup of a sob. “Sollux, you heard, didn’t you? About how Nepeta, um, found Aradia’s body, when she was hunting – she’s dead, Sollux.”

“…I know,” Sollux said, and his heart twisted at the painful memory. He couldn’t bring himself to look Tavros in the eyes, unable to stomach the guilt. He’d been too self-absorbed, too wrapped up in his own misery to think about how much Aradia’s death had to be tearing other trolls apart – especially Tavros, who was her closest friend, her FLARPing buddy, her partner in Team Charge.

Without warning, Tavros threw his arms around Sollux’s waist and squeezed, burying his face into his stomach. _Well, this is sufficiently awkward,_ Sollux thought. “TV, what are you doing,” he asked flatly.

“She’s gone,” Tavros said, his words muffled in the fabric of Sollux’s shirt. “My best friend is gone, and I’m never going to get to see her again.”

Sollux clumsily patted his back and he half-listened to what Tavros was blubbering to him, half-grappled with himself. He finally couldn’t bear being silent anymore, his chest constricted in repressed agony. He cut Tavros off mid-sentence and blurted out, “TV, listen to me. _I killed her._ ”

All the blood drained from Tavros’s face, leaving his complexion a sickly ashen color, and he backed away. “Why?” he asked, his voice little more than a whisper.

The betrayal in his eyes was too much for him to bear, and he fumbled to explain. “No, I didn’t want to, it was the mind honey, I never meant to, you know I wouldn’t—” But there was no way to excuse his actions. Even if Vriska had influenced him to eat the mind honey, she hadn’t influenced him to kill Aradia. No, that blame lay solely with himself.

Tears sprang to Tavros’s eyes, and Sollux’s stomach plummeted. “TV, don’t, I…” He reached out a hand to try and reassure him. But the sound that Tavros made was primal, an animalistic keen that was raw with pain. He wasn’t listening anymore, and he pushed past Sollux, the bulky four wheel device ramming into his side and knocking him to the ground. Sollux didn’t know if it was intentional or not, but either way, he deserved it. He watched Tavros until the other troll was out of sight, distancing himself from the monster he had become.

——————————————

It took several nights of moping around for Sollux to get up the courage to talk to Tavros again. It was his lusus, of all people, to smack some sense in him – quite literally, in fact. Sollux had been talking while strifing with his lusus when he brought up his serving of honey at mealtime, airing out all of his frustrations and misery. Bicyclops got the best of him and knocked him to the ground, using one giant hand to pin him down to the floor. The sad blue eye regarded him with remarkable keenness, and Sollux understood the message being communicated: stop complaining, and do something about it.

He finally left his hive and headed westward, trying not to think about what had happened the last time he left his city behind and entered the countryside. After a bit of a hike —god, he needed to exercise more instead of cooping himself up with his computers all day— Tavros’s hive finally came into view, the tall blue windmill rising up above it.

It took him a good five minutes to work up the courage to actually knock on Tavros’s door. Tavros didn’t answer the door right away, and Sollux was almost considering giving up and absconding while he still could, when the door finally rattled and swung open.

“Sorry, I, uh, had some difficulty, getting in my, um— oh.” Tavros looked up at Sollux from where he was sitting in his four wheel device. “Hi.”

“Hey, TV.” Sollux lifted a hand in greeting. An awkward silence ensued before Sollux blurted out, “So I—”

“Do you—”

They both broke off at the same time, clamping their mouths shut.

“You can go first—”

“No, no, I can wait, you go.”

“Okay. Um. Do you… want to come inside?”

“Yeah, sure, I’d like that.”

Sollux tried to shake off his nerves as he followed Tavros into his hive, stopping when they emerged into the communal entertainment block. It looked as if someone had been living out of it. A mound of soft host plushies were gathered at one end of the couch, plates and glasses littered the floor, and Fiduspawn cards and gamegrubs were scattered throughout.

“Sorry,” Tavros mumbled. “I’d take you up to my respiteblock, but, uh, the carpenter drones haven’t gotten around to installing ramps in my hive…”

“So, what, you’re sleeping down here?” Sollux looked around the block. “What about your recuperacoon?”

Tavros shrugged. “I’ve been trying to make do without it, and, well, it’s not so bad, because it’s not like I ever really got a solid day’s sleep, since my horns don’t really fit into it anymore anyway…”

Sollux frowned. Well, at least that explained why Tavros looked so exhausted. He could barely sleep himself, but at least he had the sopor slime to soothe him when he was in his cocoon. Tavros had it even worse than he did, in comparison. He couldn’t even escape the daymares that haunted him in his sleep, separated from the comforting warm embrace of the slime.

“Sorry,” he said, the words feeling woefully inadequate, but he didn’t know what else to say.

“It’s okay, it’s not your fault,” Tavros said, giving him a wistful smile. “I’m getting used to it.”

Sollux didn’t say anything. It may not have been his fault that Tavros couldn’t walk, but it was his fault that he no longer had a best friend. He had a sudden and intense desire to communicate to Tavros that he never intended to hurt Aradia, that it was tearing him up inside just as much. “TV, you know that I didn’t want to hurt AA, right? I never, ever, wanted to hurt her, I just, I couldn’t control myself, and I loathe myself because I couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t save her because I was too fucking weak to fight the mind honey. I killed her, and it was like killing a part of me, you’ve got to understand.” Tavros opened his mouth to say something, but Sollux plowed on heedlessly. “You hate me, don’t you?” He hunched over, hands fisting in his hair in frustration and self-loathing. “God, _I_ hate me!” Red and blue crackled from behind his glasses as he struggled to control himself.

He heard a soft sound and looked back up, willing the sparks in his vision to die down, and found Tavros gazing at him with an odd expression on his face. Tender, even. Confusion swirled around in his think pan, mixing with the voices that always plagued him, and he couldn’t think straight, the cacophony eclipsing him as he got lost in the endless whirl of _Why is he looking at me like that, he should be pushingyellingscreaminghating, I killed his best friend, I did it it was me, my fault, all of it, mine mine mine, I’m the one who should be dead right now, not AA—_

Then Tavros laid a hand on his arm, and the voices fell miraculously, blissfully silent.

“No,” Tavros said, a sad little smile twisting the corner of his mouth. “I just pity you.”

Sollux’s stomach flip-flopped with something he couldn’t properly identify. All he knew was that it felt like a colony of butterflies had hatched inside him. He realized with a jolt that this was the first emotion he felt since Aradia’s death and the hollow, empty sadness and self-hatred that had ensnared him ever since.

He looked back at Tavros, with his useless legs and his shitty luck and his inability to be a proper ruthless troll, and the fact that he was still so honest and open and optimistic despite all of the misfortune that befell him, and it hit him – pity. He was feeling pity for Tavros. It was paler than his feelings for Aradia, sure, but they were just as strong.

Sollux cracked a careful, hesitant smile. “Yeah, TV,” he said, and winced at the slight croaking of his voice. He cleared his throat and continued, “I guess I’m feeling pretty pale for you too.”

Tavros grinned back up at him, and if Sollux wasn’t mistaken, he noticed a bit of shyness there too. Affection and gratitude overwhelmed him, and he fell to his knees by Tavros’s four wheel device and hugged him. “Thanks,” he whispered, glad that Tavros couldn’t see his face when it was tucked into his shirt.

Tavros hummed and placed his chin on Sollux’s head. “It’s okay. I don’t blame you,” he murmured, wrapping his arms around his shoulders.

And this time, Sollux let Tavros hold him, breathing an unconscious sigh of relief. These were the words he needed to hear. He’d found someone who could keep the voices at bay, someone who could counter his self-loathing, someone who balanced out his unyielding pessimism and mood swings.

He just wished it hadn’t taken the death of his matesprit to bring the two of them together.

Still, for the first time in a long time, Sollux felt like maybe, just maybe, with Tavros by his side… everything would be 0kay.


End file.
